


Xerophyte

by JjdoggieS



Series: All Is Calm, All Is Bright [24]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (Comics), The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Denial, Denial of Feelings, Diego Hargreeves-centric, F/M, Ficmas, Ficmas 2020, First Kiss, Flirting, Harcest Ficmas, Harcest Ficmas 2020, Kissing, Mistletoe, Oblivious, Pre-Canon, Teen Romance, Teenage Drama, Teenagers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:33:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28391730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JjdoggieS/pseuds/JjdoggieS
Summary: After Allison, newly returned from shooting some stupid, cheesy kiddy Christmas movie, hung some plastic mistletoe on the doorway leading into the training room, in a pitiful attempt to get Luther tofinallykiss her, Diego knew it wouldn't work. Luther was dumber than a sack of bricks when dealing withanythingthat was emotional or sensitive. But what he hadn't expected, was to catch his other sister, Vanya, underneath it one day.Harcest Ficmas: Day 24 - Mistletoe
Relationships: Diego Hargreeves/Vanya Hargreeves
Series: All Is Calm, All Is Bright [24]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2034832
Comments: 4
Kudos: 27
Collections: Harcest Ficmas 2020





	Xerophyte

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mave_m](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mave_m/gifts).



The second that Diego saw those fucking stupid, tacky, plastic leaves of mistletoe hanging above the training room door that it had been Allison’s doing, and that whatever feeble attempt she  _ thought _ it might have with getting Luther to kiss her  _ again _ would fail. And he wasn’t at all surprised when the mistletoe, even though it was some shitty plastic replica, had them each entering and exiting the training room one at a time and as fast as possible. None of them wanting to linger by the doorframe any longer than absolutely necessary.

What  _ had _ surprised Diego was that Sir Reginald, the general killjoy he was, actually let Allison leave the shit hanging above the door in the training room. (Probably with the help of a Rumor or two.) Although, not without continuous reminders not to let such frivolous things distract them from their mission of saving the world from some supposed ‘end of the world’ that they were meant to stop. Like that was ever  _ actually _ going to happen. If anything, Reginald had completely lost his marbles in his old age, however old he  _ really _ was.

Adding to Diego’s list of surprises this week, when he’d been sent to go get some new shipment of knives (because for some reason that was  _ his _ job, just because he was the only one that still used knives in their training), he  _ nearly _ crashed into Vanya of all people in the doorway. “What the hell are you doing here?” Diego hissed, leveling Vanya a glare as he ignored the snickering of Klaus and Allison behind him. Luther was in the middle of ‘special training’ with Reginald and Ben tended to stay out of gossipy-prankish manners.

“I, I was ju-just. Um. I was-” God Vanya could hardly get a sentence out if it wasn’t directed at Ben, or Five (at least before the asshole ditched them all in favor of his fucking time travel).

“Just, shut up.” Diego growled, watching as Vanya clamped her mouth shut at his order, “And get out of my way, some of us have  _ important _ work to be doing.” As he expected, Vanya quickly moved far out of his way, trying to make herself as small as possible in the corner of the hallway.

But just as he walked out of the training room, Klaus piped up with, “Ah, ah, ah! Not so fast Diego dearest.”

“What now Klaus?” Diego hissed, whirling around to glare at his brother. Allison and Klaus, both with matching, annoying, impish grins and knowing looks on their faces, pointed to the green plastic leaves stuck on the top of the doorframe. “No.”

“Yes.” Klaus said.

Diego, firm in his stance, told them, “I’m not doing it. And you can’t make me.” sounding very much like a six year old child and  _ not  _ the sixteen year old teenager he was.

“Oh, really?” Allison asked, giving him the  _ look _ she gave them before she’d rumor them to do as she please. At least, as long as Reginald, Pogo, or Mom weren’t present.

Diego rolled his eyes, continuing to glare at Allison and Klaus as he snapped, “Vanya! Come here!” His debatable more pleasurable yet achingly boring sister quickly moved to be standing near him, knowing by now not to stand as close to him as she would with Ben or Five. And before Vanya started asking a thousand questions about what he wanted from her, because she  _ always  _ did it, Diego held the sides of her face, feeling her stiffen and watching her eyes widened as he did, but ignoring it in favor of getting the stupid kiss over with so he could get back to training. Once Diego quickly kissed Vanya, a bit surprised when she kissed him back, he went back to completely ignoring his ordinary sister’s presence and hissed at Allison and Klaus, “Happy?” before walking off to get the supplies he’d been tasked with retrieving.

As he stormed down the hall, he could hear Klaus and Allison’s laughter and Vanya sputtering something as someone, who was likely Ben, tried talking to her. Whatever. They’re all idiots anyway. And Diego was counting down the five hundred ninety three days between now and when they  _ finally _ turned eighteen and he could leave this hell and never come back.

It wasn’t until he was searching through the boxes upon boxes of ‘training’ supplies, most of which they never used, that he noticed the warm feeling in his chest, the heat dusting his cheeks, or the burning of his lips. Whatever the hell was happening to him, it was Vanya’s fault. Well, and Allison and Klaus’s, but mostly Vanya’s for whatever weird ordinary illness she’d given him that was causing all of this. Forcing himself to push away the recurring new memory from continuously playing in his head, Diego found the box he was looking for, which was much lighter than he’d been expecting, grabbed it, and walked back to the training room.

By the time that Diego returned to the training room, Allison, Klaus, and Ben were being instructed by Mom for their group training while Diego was instructed upon returning that he was to do target practice for the remainder of training. And Vanya was nowhere to be seen. Good.

Diego dropped the box near where he  _ typically _ stood, ripped the top of the cardboard off, and gathered up a handful of them, aligning himself up with the severely punctured target he’d been using that week. He placed the handful of knives he’d taken out of the box, laying them out on a nearby table. Taking one of the knives back with him, Diego realigned himself with his target again. Now, typically when he was doing target practice, Diego pictured either Luther’s face or Reginald's head in the center, (it helped him get some pent up anger and frustrations at them out  _ and _ it helped improve his accuracy) but today, every time he lined up one of his throws, that stupid warm feeling in his chest came back and it would mess him up.

Which lead to Diego making the obvious connection between not being able to throw as accurately as he  _ always _ did and the odd  _ warm _ feeling in his chest as that he was sick. Obviously, that must be the  _ only _ reason for the weirdness today affecting him today. “Mom.” Diego said, leaving where he was meant to be doing target practice and instead crossing the training room to where Mom was having Ben, Allison, and Klaus doing some weird cardio routine, it honestly looked like something from an 80’s workout ‘jazzercise’ video old people used instead of  _ actually _ doing a workout.

“Yes Diego dear?” Mom asked, turning her attention from his siblings to him, “You’re supposed to be training your projectile accuracy with target practice right now.”

“I, I know mom.” Diego said, nudging Klaus with his foot when his brother started giggling, causing Klaus to lose his balance on the plank they’d been doing, “It’s just that I, I think I might be sick.”

As soon as Diego had said that he  _ thought _ he  _ might _ be sick, he could see Allison, Ben, and Klaus’s heads whip up, since typically when one of them got sick the rest were sick soon after, as well as Mom quickly placing one of her hands on his forehead, then moving down to cup his cheek. “Well,” Mom said, pulling her hand from his cheek, “your cheeks seem to be a bit flushed. But it doesn’t seem like you’re sick. How about we step out of the room and talk about this a bit more?”

Mom lead Diego from the training room, instructing his siblings to take a short break while they were talking. Once in the hallway, Mom asked, “Can you describe to me what’s causing you to believe you’re unwell Diego?” Diego described to Mom what he’d been feeling (leaving out the part about having to kiss Vanya) and after he’d done so, Mom told him, “Well, I don’t think you’re sick, it just sounds like you’re nervous about something. But, how about this, go rest up in your room until dinner, I’ll take care of everything else.”

Telling Mom a quick thanks, Diego walked back to his room from the training room, speeding past the tolerable screeching of a violin coming from the closed door, and into his bedroom. He locked the door behind him, well, as well as he could since Reginald had ripped the locks of their doors. Right around the same time that he  _ thankfully _ took the cameras out of their rooms, since apparently to that asshole, giving one form of privacy back but taking another one away was justified. Pushing away any and all thoughts of  _ Reginald _ out of his head, because he didn’t need to waste any more time on him, and instead dropped onto his bed and pulled one of his pillows over his face.

Diego laid on his bed, trying to clear his thoughts. Maybe he was just psyching himself out. Mom said she didn’t think anything was wrong with him, or couldn’t  _ find _ anything wrong with him. And as he laid on his bed, trying to clear his thoughts, get over whatever mental block was causing him to be all out of sorts today, and each time he tried to get his head on straight, his mind kept replaying him and Vanya kissing.

What the hell?

It’s not like he liked Vanya. He barely even  _ tolerated _ his sister, and even that was pushing it some days. So why the hell was he thinking about kissing her over and over again? Him kissing her. Her kissing him back. And why did he want to do it again?

Wait what?

God, he must really be sick. Who the hell wants to kiss their sister? Well, not  _ really _ his sister, none of them were  _ actually  _ siblings. That was just what their cult leader told them to call each other. Probably to keep Child Protective Services from taking five superpowered kids and an ordinary kid away from a billionaire that bought them over sixteen years ago when he never should’ve been able to purchase from around the world. Forced ‘family’ at its finest.

The more Diego thought about it, the less weird it was. No one cared about Luther and Allison’s  _ thing _ or the looks that Klaus was  _ always _ giving Ben. Why would it be so weird if he kissed Vanya again? If Luther, Allison, Klaus, or Ben said anything about it, Diego would just punch them in the face; it’s not like any of Reginald’s threats scared him anymore.

While Diego was, surprisingly to him, thinking about kissing Vanya again, and what the implications of those thoughts meant for him, there was a knock at his door. “Go away.” Diego called without thinking, his typical response whenever someone knocked on his door, since Reginald didn’t bother knocking on anyone’s door and just walked in.

“Diego?” God, what did Vanya want now? “Can, can we talk?”

No.” Diego answered, throwing his pillow at the door, hearing Vanya’s yelp at the sudden impact on the door, “Go away Vanya.”

Rather than listen to what he’d told her, his door slowly creaked open and Vanya’s head popped in through the gap. “Diego?” Vanya asked, shyly stepping into his room, “I, I need to talk to you.”

Diego, with what he hoped was an uncaring, annoyed expression on his face, asked, “What about?” but for some reason, he couldn’t keep his eyes from looking at Vanya’s lips as she talked about whatever she needed to say. Without even realizing he was moving, Diego had gotten off his bed and walked from it to standing right in front of Vanya.

“Diego?” Vanya questioned, looking at him with wide eyes, “What, what are you doing?”

Apparently, Diego had lost all control of his movements because before either of them realized what he was doing, his hands were cupping Vanya’s face again, and he was kissing her again. And she was kissing him back. Without thinking, Diego’s hands slid down from cupping Vanya’s face to hooking under her legs and lifting her up against his door. Obviously, neither of them, or, at least Diego hadn’t, planned on making out as Vanya was pushed up against Diego’s door, but neither of them were exactly putting a stop to it either. It wasn’t until one of Vanya’s hands were pushing feebly against his chest that Diego remembered that other people couldn’t hold their breath indefinitely as he could.

Upon this realization, Diego pulled back, carefully lowering Vanya back down until her feet were firmly on the ground, feeling Vanya’s labored breathing as she tried to get some air back into her lungs. Once she had gotten enough air, her labored breathing returning to near silent breaths, she looked at him with wide eyes, like prey would look at their predator. Diego pointed to his door, wordlessly telling her to leave, and Vanya gave him a small nod, turned on her heel, and left his room without another word. Leaving Diego to sit with what he’d just done.

Maybe him and Vanya kissing and making out every once in a while wouldn’t be such a bad thing.

**Author's Note:**

> Update survey if you're interested -> https://forms.gle/kj4UBqMeUThavmnx6


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